3 years in prison is a long time. 3 years in prison is a long time (to me) for any crime short of rape or murder or something with a similar level of violence and harm to others. When educated white guys go to prison for that long there's always a brief collective "whoa, whoa, isn't that a pretty harsh punishment?" even as similar or greater sentences get dished out for drug and property crimes which basically harm no one.
Still I'd like to settle on the new normal that 3 years in an American prison is actually a pretty harsh punishment, for almost every crime.
